More photos

new february 2008

click to see the slideshow

Yet Another Slideshow

It's just too easy with Picassa to upload these slideshows.

February 08

Highlights of this one:

Sara learns to hold on to a rattle.
Lauren Visit
Sara can hold her head up.
Sara sucks her thumb

Hope vs Fear

This year's US presidential election seems to be stacking up as a choice between Hope and Fear.
I don't believe the argument that there is no significant difference between the Democratic and Republican ideologies.

Barack is the candidate for Hope and McCain for Fear. Hillary is using Hope to campaign against the Republicans and fear that Barack is incompetent to win if he gets the nomination.

Republicans would probably call Fear "Pragmatism", and Hope "Idealism". But we've had "pragmatism" over the last 8 years and it hasn't been too convincing. The argument that "it would have been worse if we hadn't been pragmatic" sounds like Fear to me.

I think Barack is doing a good idea of distinguishing Hope from Idealism in his campaign speeches. But i would like to add that we are a nation founded on Ideals.

The 3 American ideals are Freedom, Independence and Equality. The Declaration of Independence stated that "All Men are Created Equal" is a self-evident truth and gave us the right to "liberty and the pursuit of happiness". We are bound to these principles from the moment of our conception. This is the fabric of the nation. It's more important than our recent economic prosperity. We got lucky and won WWII, and became the wealthiest, most powerful nation in the history of the world. That bit of luck was greatly helped by our ideals, which attracted the Jewish scientists who built the Atomic Bomb to America. But prosperity and world power is NOT what America has ever been ABOUT. We were a great nation BEFORE we were powerful. We can be greater in the future. Prosperity comes and goes, but having a solid ideological foundation can be permanent if we refuse to give it up.

As we all know, the fabric of America been forever flawed. We don't have perfect freedom, independence or equality today. It is better today than it was in the founders' days, or in the Civil War. It has always been a very painful work in progress. I, for one, am going to leap on the chance in this election to renew the reparation of the flaws in our national fabric.

I'm voting with Hope.

Sara slideshow

More Sara Baby Photos

See the latest slide show of Sara. Click on the photo to see the big photos, otherwise watch them go by on the screen.

A Smile

Gan managed to capture a smile from Sara "on film". She smiles quite a bit these days, but rarely for long enough to get a photo.

Picasa!

People have been complaining that we need to update the photos on the blog, but it's pretty time-consuming, and we're busy. So i learned about a great google program called Picasa, which allows me to organize my photos on my computer (it's truly amazing) and post sets of photos to the web. I'm now a walking advertisement for google, but hey...enjoy the photos.


Click here to see the slideshow: 2008-01

What Sara Likes

The activities of a 2 month old are pretty limited, but we can tell what she likes and what she doesn't like.

Her favorite things are taking a bath and going for a walk in the stroller. These things calm her down even when she's screaming.

Another favorite is her "belly time". This is where we put her on her belly. She likes to move her head from side to side. Check out the smile in the first photo. Also, i really like the action shot.

Another thing she loves recently is the "mobile" i made for her in her swinging chair. 

Sara Speaks at 5 weeks!

See what's on Sara's mind at this stage of her life. She likes swinging to the music. She's not so patient with her newbie parents, though.

Our little Sara at 2 months

I'm finding myself more familiar with the roof of Sara's mouth, and the underside of her tongue than her beautiful brown eyes...
She really likes her "Belly Time", where she picks up her head and moves it from side to side. She can amuse herself for about 10 minutes like that before she starts looking more like the second photo.

Other things she likes are baths and walks in the stroller. Those amuse her indefinitely.
Things she hates: Just about everything else.

Thanks to Xin for the new camera, I love it! Hopefully it will inspire more posts.

A new web page for Steve

I just found out about googlepages, where you can create a web page and upload things besides photos. I used it to create a site to store stuff that i write up in power point or pdf form, which i can't put on the blog. You can check out my new homepage at steve.eichblatt.googlepages.com

The Joys of being a Dylan collector

For reasons unexplained, this text was included in a Dylan bootleg that I downloaded. I thought it was worth posting.


In the service of God, one can learn three things from a child and seven from a thief.
"From a child you can learn:
(1) always to be happy;
(2) never to sit idle; and
(3) to cry for everything one wants.
From a thief you should learn:
(1) to work at night;
(2) if one cannot gain what one wants in one night to try again the next night;
(3) to love one's coworkers just as thieves love each other;
(4) to be willing to risk one's life even for a little thing;
(5) not to attach too much value to things even though one has risked one's life for them -- just as a thief will resell a stolen article for a fraction of its real value;
(6) to withstand all kinds of beatings and tortures but to remain what you are; and
(7) to believe that your work is worthwhile and not be willing to change it."

(Hasidic text)
- Dov Baer, the Mazid of Mezeritch ('The Wisdom of the Jewish Mystics')

Icicle on the Bicycle

I rode my bike to work the other day and then it started sleeting. So i had to ride home in an ice storm. It was a lot more fun than i expected it to be. The only bad thing was that cars passing by would sling slush all over me. Fortunately, only about 3 cars passed me on the way home. The other bad thing was it was very steep downhill, so i had to ride on the brake the whole time. This made my hands very cold.

Riding a bike on ice feels more stable than walking on ice.
I guess because when you walk, you are shifting your weight on every step, which you don't do on a bike.

There was ice all over the handlebars by the time i got home. The next day all the tree branches and even the blades of grass were all covered in a thick coat of ice. It was beautiful. These photos just do not do the ice justice.

Sara at one month

I wanted to post about something OTHER than Sara, but i can't resist putting pictures of the cute kid here. We really like that sweater she's wearing in the first photo. That was made by my friend Toni's mom, for his daughter, and they passed it on to us. Every time Sara wears it, we feel special.

fussy sara

There are actually people who doubt that Sara is ever fussy. This video is evidence to the contrary. And this warn't even the half of it!

sara on changing table

This is sara at 4 weeks old, lying on the diaper changing table, which she loves. This is good because she's got her eyes open and she's not fussing.

sara with grandpa

Grandpa and Grandma Jody came to visit in New Jersey

Visit from the Dad, Jody and Lauren

I guess you can see what all these photos have in common. One of these days i need a blog entry that doesn't have anything to do with Sara. But it seems like everyone's enjoying the monomania.

Sara of the Double Crown

Sara has 2 cowlicks, or "crowns" in her hair. My friend Frankie told me that was a sign of good luck. I looked it up on the internet and it's true! (see here). It is also a sign of intelligence.

(I'll try and take a clearer picture later to replace this one)

I'm so mad at my mother!

After weeks of effort and ups and downs, within inches of success, we won't be breastfeeding Sara anymore.

It looked like we had actually succeeded, despite many ups and downs. I spent a lot of energy encouraging Gan when times were hard.

But then when we were on the razor's edge, my mom, frustrated with trying to convince me to give up on breastfeeding, took matters into her own hands. Since Mom had failed to breastfeed, I guess she didn't want to see why anyone else might want to overcome the difficulties and succeed. So, she went for the jugular and sent this "caring" e-mail to Gan (not copying me, of course).

Dear Gan: Steve told me about the mastitis. I feel so sorry for you. You're having a hard time, with heavy bleeding and sore, inflamed breasts. My heart goes out to you. If you were my daughter (and therefore I had the right to give you advice whether you wanted it or not) I would say, "Put Sara on a bottle and enjoy her." Your overall health is more important than the small benefits to Sara's health. You gave breastfeeding a valiant try, which is all a parent can ever do.

I love you. Please don't be mad at me for meddling. When Sara is all grown up and on her own, you will still tell her how to live. Mothers are like that.

--
Regards,

And what do you know, it worked!

Kind of like saying to a recovering alcoholic "So sad about your wife leaving you. Come let me buy you a drink!".

Good job, Mom.

Welcome to the Machine

At the tender young age of 3 weeks, Sara has already been stamped and labeled. Actually, i think it's pretty cool that she received some mail in her name. It's her second official document, after her birth certificate.

Plus, i had fun figuring out how to smudge the secret information on the image.